Pet Pawrents, Be Alert!

Halloween was a month back but some scary things are forever. Like when your pet goes missing or worse, he gets dognapped. Don’t believe us? Read on to find out more.

The Problem:

Incident 1:

A resident of Gurugram took his dog for a walk one morning but what happened after that was beyond our imagination. Two guys on a bike came and threatened to kill the pet parent with a gun if he didn’t let him take his dog away. The poor lad had no other option but to comply. He lodged a complaint immediately but nothing happened. He looked for his dog for a week but he couldn’t find his whereabouts. 

Incident 2:

A dog walker in Gurugram was walking a Great Dane in the vicinity of the society they lived in and suddenly he was attacked by two men with a knife and these men took the dog away. 

Incident 3:

A dog was happily playing in the yard of his house when a guy came and dognapped him and put him in a van. 

Have these incidents spooked you enough? We have just started scratching the surface. 

The Reason

Now let us talk about why these cases are taking place. The primary reason for such cold-blooded incidents are backyard illegal breeding. These poor dogs are taken away and forcefully made to mate and once the female dogs give birth to a litter of pure-bred puppies, they are then sold in the market as the demand is pretty high. These poor females are made to breed so many times and kept in such a bad shape and the male dogs are also abused or drugged for the process multiple times. Once they are unable to mate, these poor souls are abandoned and thrown away in the streets to die. They become so frail and have tons of infections and eventually they succumb to these problems and die. 

A lot of people go to the police to lodge a complaint but sometimes the police isn’t very cooperative and most of the times they don’t even take it seriously. 

If you thought that only pure-bred dogs are taken away in such a brutal way then you are absolutely wrong. Stray dogs also get dognapped and they are sold in the meat industry to those who consume dog meat. Their condition is worse than that of the pet dogs. 

These incidents also happen because sometimes there is an involvement of the house helps or the dog walkers who tip off the dognappers and get money for the same. There was an incident in Faridabad where a dog walker was careless enough to tie feeble and sweet dogs to trees and leave them alone while he did other tasks. He wanted to make extra money by taking another dog for a walk while the first one was tied down to a tree or a post. When a lot of people found out about it, they were appalled by how he put the beloved pets at risk just to make a quick buck here and there. 

In some cases, the dog was roaming around without a leash with a pet parent and he was dognapped. 

There is no end to such incidents and it curls our toes to think of what our pets might go through. Moreover, not many dogs have been found again after they were kidnapped unless you got some help from someone who knew such shady dog breeders and acted for the same.

Solution:

Such cases in Delhi and NCR have become so common that it is imperative that you be extremely careful and take extra care. 

• Be vigilant about where your pet is at all times. Try and keep him on a leash at such times so that you at least have some control over who is around and where he goes while you guys are walking.
• Do a background check on all the house helps, dog walkers and see to it that the society also does a background check for the guards. 
• Introduce your dog walker to the guards so that they know that only this person can be seen with your dog and nobody else unless you have notified them beforehand.
• Be in touch with the animal NGOs in the city as they can help you get a complaint lodged if the police refuse to help. If your dog gets taken then spread the word at all the possible places as this step will help you get him back if he has been abandoned by the breeder somewhere.
• If your dogs are neutered then the chances of getting dognapped go down drastically. This will be good for your dog in general and help you keep the dognappers at bay.
• If you see any shady men loitering around your house then please notify the guards of your society and if possible, notify the authorities as well. 
• You can also put a chip in your dog and get him a collar with all the personal details just in case someone finds him loitering around somewhere.
• Keep in touch with some dog walkers as they sometimes know some of these breeders and can help you rescue your dog.

Our Two Cents

There are no set rules as to how you should be careful but keeping your eyes and ears open and not trusting every person that comes in your society might help you keep your pet safe. 

We hope that this article will help shed some light on this issue and soon there will be some measures taken to curb it. We will tackle more such vital issues on our blog so stay tuned!